Kelley Burgess started her career as a legal assistant in law firms in New Jersey and now resides in Texas after receiving a Bachelor's degree in Paralegal Studies from the University of Maryland. After serving as a college speech tournament judge on the side for three years, Kelley switched to a teaching career in communications. She became a certified educator in Texas and spent five years teaching speech, debate, and mediation at the high-school level, and she was named in Who's Who of America's Best Teachers in 2003, 2004, and 2005. She now freelances as a public-speaking coach and is the author and presenter of the half-day seminar "Serving with Maximum Effectiveness" (a seminar specifically tailored for ministers). She travels to various states across the U.S., assisting ministers in their public-speaking skills. Kelley resides in Carrollton, Texas, with her husband, Tom, where they are joyfully anticipating the arrival of their first child.
Katrina McBride's career reflects extensive experience in organizational leadership, marketing strategies, and market development in multi-national corporate environments and as an independent consultant. Her leadership abilities have been utilized by employers and clients to develop new programs and functional areas and to reorganize resources with aggressive deadlines. She has positively impacted revenue and customer satisfaction for large, global organizations as well as small to mid-sized businesses that are experiencing changes due to rapid growth or restructuring to maintain their competitive position.
In director-level positions for Nortel Networks, Katrina was engaged to develop, define, and implement strategies for competitive intelligence, sales support, emerging markets, lead generation, and customer relationship management. Sought after as a trainer, speaker, and facilitator, Katrina develops and presents professional education courses in leadership development, team strategies, strategic marketing, organizational leadership, and change planning.
She is an active member of the American Marketing Association, the American Management Association, Society for Human Resources Management, and the Aircraft Owners & Pilots Association, and she’s served on the board of directors of the Dallas chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners.
Katrina holds an M.A. in organizational management and a B.S. in psychology, as well as certifications in mid-management/leadership and marketing. She is a trained dispute mediator.
Katherine Squires Pang, J.D., LL.M., M.Ed received her B.A. in 1980 from Clark University, her J.D. from the University of Dayton Law School in 1982, her LL.M in Taxation from Georgetown University Law School in 1983, and her M.Ed from the University of Texas in 2001. She has practiced law with national law firms since 1983, ran for the United States Senate in California in 1994, and was appointed by Governor Wilson as a Commissioner to the WCAB from 1994 to 1996. Dr. Pang has served as an adjunct faculty member in the Graduate School of Management at the University of Texas, Dallas, and has been an adjunct faculty member in the law and business schools of many universities, including the Stern School of Business at New York University, Pepperdine University, USC, Golden Gate University, and the University of California, Irvine.
In addition to having over 20 years of law firm experience, Dr. Pang has founded several companies, including LawPrep, Inc., LawPrep Press, Inc., Legal EdNet.com, and EdWay Online. From 1989 to 1996, Dr. Pang authored several books, videos, and interactive CD-ROMs. Dr. Pang was also the manager for firm-wide practice section development, training, and forms for Akin, Gump, Strauss, Hauer, & Feld, L.L.P.
Dr. Pang has experience providing multimedia, interactive distributed learning to working professionals and adult learners in law and business through a variety of technologies, including video streaming and online conferencing (Webcasts, synchronous and asynchronous threaded discussion boards, and chat rooms) via the Internet and satellite, as well as ISDN-based videoconferencing on CD-ROM. Dr. Pang has been a speaker at the MEC 2001 Conference: Turning a New Page in Educational Technologies, sponsored by Arizona State University; the 2001 Conference on Training and Knowledge Management: Moving Beyond Training, sponsored by Generation 21 Learning Management Systems; and a speaker at various other e-learning conferences. She has design, development, implementation, and managerial experience in educational multimedia course design and creation. She has been responsible for course design and delivery using Macromedia Director, Windows Media Player, FrontPage, PowerPoint, Blackboard, Prometheus, WebCT, Webboard, and a host of other proprietary platforms. She also has experience with digital video, MPEG, MOV, and AVI Files.
Karen Thompson graduated from USL in Lafayette, LA, in 1983 with a B.S./B.A. in Economics. She is currently the vice president of Amegy Bank for government guaranteed lending. Most of her career has been in the banking and finance industry, with the exception of a very educational six-year period during which she helped manage a small business.
Her education, work experience, hands-on business management, and passion for helping small business owners led to her current position with Amegy Bank. She is also the recipient of the 2007 Financial Services Champion of the Year award for Dallas/Fort Worth, given by the U.S. Small Business Administration.